FAIRVIEW PARK MASTER PLAN MEETING

INTRO AND OBJECTIVES - Last Wednesday, November 8, 2023, I attended a meeting at the Costa Mesa Senior Center to discuss the Fairview Park Master Plan.  Once again, the hosts optimistically anticipated a couple hundred attendees and, once again, we were disappointed as fewer than 60 people were in the room, and at least a third of those were City staffers or consultants.  Fewer than 20 of us spoke during the Q & A session.

THE DISCUSSION LEADERS - The meeting was kicked off by Jenni Zell of consultants MIG.  She handed it off to Fairview Park Administrator Kelly Dalton.  Then the bulk of the presentation was done by consultant Travis Brooks from Land IG, who was joined later by Robb Hamilton of Hamilton Biological.

THE PRESENTATION - The 90 minute presentation itself was outstanding.  Travis Brooks and Robb Hamilton did a good job of guiding us through the whole thing.  Each of us had a multi-page handout with 66 individual photos describing the history of the area, the topography, the progression of the site and showing many images of flora and fauna from the area.  It was very informative.  You can view the slideshow HERE.

Q&A - Nineteen of us stepped to the microphones to ask questions and make comments and suggestions.  Some were knowledge-based and some were simply due to curiosity and concern.

SPEAKERS - Here is my summary of a few of the speakers who stepped up...

Long time city activist and committee participant Bill Turpit led things off by opining about the apparent unwillingness of the City Council/staff to step up and pay the real cost of restoration/maintenance and protection of the more than 200 acre site.

Henry Smith, long time member of the Harbor Soaring Society, the group whose operations at Fairview Park are currently curtailed due to perceived negative impact on the plants and birds which are part of that area, stepped up and made a not-very-veiled threat to take political action against council members who continue to support their denial of space in the park.  That was inappropriate and disappointing.

Former councilman Jay Humphrey, who remains very involved in important city issues, addressed the impact of Measure AA, which severely constrains any activity in the Park.  He said things can happen as long as they specifically involve Restoration, Preservation or Maintenance.  Someone earlier mentioned grading, which he said is not permitted.  He also spoke of the creation of a plant nursery on, or near, the site, to provide replacement foliage.

Andy Campbell, Chair of the Fairview Park Steering Committee and a hydrologist by profession, spoke of mitigating the impact of the gliders, removal of the fill in the canyon area, the need to restore the vernal pool drainage and asked about the dormant Storm Drain Master Plan.  He spoke a second time later and asked about the State Grant from Senator Min and wondered how soon it must be spent or lost.

Cynthia D'Agosto, former Fairview Park Administrator and continuing activist, also addressed drainage and vernal pools.  She actually spoke twice.  The second time she addressed the "cultural resources" buried in the park and the approvals necessary to further investigate/protect them. She also commented that Fairview Park is not managed the same way as other city parks due to Measure AA.

Planning Commissioner Angely Andrade Vallarta, attending with her young daughter, thanked the moderators for the presentation and acknowledged the need to address the issues presented and described the Park as one of the City "Hot Topics".

"Kyle", who has been at many meetings lately, thanked the presenters for the historical perspective and bemoaned the small turnout, citing the need for better outreach.

"Paul", from the Banning Ranch Conservancy, also thanked the presenters for the historical perspective and said they supported the habitat restoration.  He cited the proximity to the Talbert Nature Preserve and the recently re-named Randall Preserve and said they would be VERY interested in the recommendations that come out of these meetings.

"Ben", in response to earlier comments about the bicyclers who used the dirt "jumps", suggested just moving them.  He also suggested making it harder for people to stray from the established, approved trails.

Flo Martin, long time city activist and proponent of walking and biking, asked about the number of Park Rangers assigned and in place in the Park on a daily basis.  Kelly Dalton had no numbers.  She also decried the threat by Henry Smith.

60-year resident John Rittenhouse, a member of the Harbor Soaring Society, attempted to defuse the anger about Henry Smith's earlier comment by inviting folks to the Park the 1st and 3rd Saturdays to enjoy the flying and learn about aviation.  He suggested we "stay the course before we judge".

Activist Cynthia McDonald, a self-described "pro-bike" person, expressed concern about the impact of bicycling within the Park.  She described her personal history with the creation of the Waldorf School (contiguous with the Park) and the evolution of parking spaces and drainage and the jeopardy the vernal pools had been in recently.

"Diane", a lady in the pink-trimmed hat, stepped up to suggest regularly-scheduled meetings/tours in the park to improve community awareness.

I was the final speaker and agreed with "Diane".  I spoke about the guided tour I joined in the spring during which we had a chance to see the full vernal pools in all their aquatic glory.  I suggested, tongue-in-cheek, that they would have made a great place for model boat racing.  Folks chuckled, nervously.  Scheduling similar tour days - perhaps quarterly - would go a very long way to educate the populace about the value of the Park.

TAKEAWAYS - 1-I was disappointed, again, at the few number of people who showed up for this very important meeting.  There were several senior staffers and I did see Planning Commission Chairman Adam Ereth in the room, but it was another meeting with fewer than 50 residents in attendance.  It was an exclamation point in the need for The City to figure out a way to cast a bigger net for these very important meetings. 2-I thought the consultants, all of them, did a very good job of presenting the program, although there seemed to be few answers to important questions asked by speakers. 3-There needs to be more of these kinds of meetings. 4-There is a need for more guided tours of the Park throughout the year.  You can follow along with the progress at the City website on this issue, HERE.

FAIRVIEW DEVELOPMENTAL CENTER ZOOM MEETING

 ZOOMING ALONG WITH THE FDC

Monday night, November 6, 2023, Costa Mesa's consultants conducted the third meeting of this series, this time via Zoom, seeking resident input on the future of the Fairview Developmental Center (FDC).  The maximum number of participants in this event were 48, including 11 consultants plus Costa Mesa's Director of Economic and Development Service, Jennifer Le.  My best guess, based on the participation in the "break out" session, was that around 30 non-staff and consultant individuals took advantage of this event to provide input.  So, fewer than 100 people took part in the three meetings in this first series of discussions on the most significant housing opportunity for our city in a generation.

SAME CONSULTANTS, SAME FORMAT

Suzanne Schwab and Karen Gulley from the consultancy, Placeworks, led the discussion again.  And, Director Le was available to respond to questions again. After a brief overview of the project and a description of the road ahead, a short Question and Answer period was conducted, then we were divided into "break out" groups - small groups who discussed our thoughts with a consultant as a moderator.  That person made notes on a "white board", which was later reviewed by the whole group.  I've included screen grabs of those four white boards for your review.  We were asked to make notes and provide comments in the "chat" area of the Zoom format indicating our top 3-5 comments.  I've provided screen grabs of those, too.

READOUTS 

COMMENTS

NEXT?  ANOTHER SERIES OF MEETINGS IN FEBRUARY

The consultants will go about their business, consolidating the comments provided in the three meetings and will conduct another series of meetings early next year - probably February.  This process will take two years and will result in a report provided to the City Council in the fall of 2025.  Meanwhile, information will be regularly updated on the website, below.  Sign up for notifications at the site shown below, as well.

MY PREVIOUS POSTS

If you wish to revisit the things I've written recently on this issue, you can click on the following links, HERE, HERE, HERE AND HERE.

THE FUTURE OF THE FDC - THE RESIDENT'S CONCERNS

I MISSED THE POINT!

Good grief!  Late last night I finally posted my long, long, long screed about the meeting held Thursday night at the Costa Mesa Senior Center concerning the future of the Fairview Developmental Center (FDC) site. (HERE)  I blathered on and on and on about the consultant’s presentation, the small crowd (50), but completely neglected to talk about what those folks who took time out of their very busy lives to attend this meeting were concerned about.  Of course, that was the whole reason for the meeting!

IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER

I’m going to attempt to present to you some of those concerns as expressed during the Q & A segment and as described in the individual table wrap-ups.  I won’t give you every comment and may not give you proper attribution to each because some folks didn’t identify themselves… here we go…

HELIPAD

As I mentioned in my earlier post, I expressed concern that, if a helipad is included in the scheme to carve out 15 acres for the Emergency Operations Center (EOC), that would be a deal breaker because nobody will want to live adjacent to a helipad designed for large military-style choppers.

SONOMA SPECIFIC PLAN

Cynthia McDonald and her hubby, Rick Huffman, lugged with them the binder for the Sonoma Specific Plan.  This is, as they described it, a “sister” site to the FDC and, according to them, was done very well.

MIXED USE

Former Councilman Jay Humphrey was concerned about the mix of residential and business uses on the site.

TRAFFIC AND ACCESS

Several attendees expressed concern about the traffic generated by the new residential uses at the site.  They were concerned about ingress and egress and how our existing transportation infrastructure could handle the increase.

HARBOR VILLAGE

Some residents were concerned about the future of Harbor Village because of the proximity to this site.

HOW BIG IS THE ACTUAL SITE?

Concern was expressed about how much land would actually be left for residential development if the EOC is included.  The number seemed to be amorphous.

COMMUNICATION/NOTIFICATON

Several people expressed concern about the apparent lack of communication about this issue.  They said they had just heard about this meeting the day before.  The small turnout supports that concern.  One speaker expressed concern that there was no video record being made of this meeting, either by The City or private sources.

PLAYING FIELDS

One speaker expressed an opinion that part of this site should be used for dedicated Little League fields, citing that The City has only one field and must depend on the Joint Use Agreement with the Newport Mesa Unified School District for playing space.

WHO CONTROLS THE PROPERTY?

Concern was expressed about just who controls the property in the future.  And who pays for it?  Should the city underwrite the cost?

PUBLIC SAFETY

Concern was expressed for the ability of our Police and Fire organizations to properly protect this property when it’s built-out.

THE PROCESS

In a bit of irony, former mayor, Sandy Genis, brought her wealth of knowledge and experience to this meeting and, among other things, spoke about her concern for “the process”, stating she was hoping for a healthy exchange of ideas - which she said while engaging in a healthy exchange of ideas.  I smiled...

SHANNON’S MOUNTAIN

Former councilwoman Wendy Leece expressed concern for “Shannon’s Mountain”, the planning for which seems to have fallen by the wayside.

AFFORDABILITY

Several attendees expressed concern for the affordability of housing on this site, stating things like, “Our kids cannot afford to live in the city where they grew up.”

THE EMERGENCY OPERATIONS CENTER

Several attendees expressed the opinion/concern that the proposed EOC is incompatible with the other residential uses planned for the site.  This was emphasized by the fact that there is a MUCH BETTER alternative site located in Tustin.  It’s bigger, (24 acres) in a commercial zone and is close to 3 freeways.

RETENTION OF EXISTING STRUCTURES

A few people felt some of the existing structures - the auditorium, pool, etc., - should be retained and re-purposed.  Others felt MOST of the existing structures should be re-used to save money.

RV PARKING

An opinion was given that the site could be used as a safe place for folks living on the streets in RVs to park their rigs safely - at least until construction begins in a few years.

PARKS, PLAYGROUNDS AND TREES

Opinions were expressed that significant outdoor recreation sites should be included in any plan - parks, playing fields, walking and bike paths.  Opinions were expressed about retaining as much of the existing tree canopy as possible.

PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION

Concern was expressed about the lack of access to public transportation.  There needs to be a “transit hub” for this site.

SCHOOLS

Some folks thought there should be planning for a school within the footprint of the site.

VETERAN AND SENIOR HOUSING

Several people spoke supporting the use of the site for housing for senior citizens and veterans.

WORKFORCE HOUSING

The project should include affordable housing for those folks who actually work in Costa Mesa, reducing long commutes from home to work.

RETENTION AND EXPANSION OF BIKE PATHS

Some speakers requested consideration be given to expanding existing bike paths nearby.

SUBSIDIZE EMPLOYEE HOUSING

The City should subsidize housing costs for employees who would reside on this site.

WATER USE

Concerns were expressed about the amount of water this site would require.

THAT’S ALL, FOLKS

There you have it, dredged from my chicken-scratch notes from the evening.  Clearly, there is plenty of concern about this project.  If you want another take on this meeting visit the entry on the Goat Hill Rodeo blog, (HERE)

AFTER THOUGHT

Considering that this meeting moved briskly and still used up the allotted time, I wonder how it would have gone if, in fact, a couple hundred people had showed up?  Would we still be there, asking and answering questions?  And, would there have been enough cookies to go around?

"VISIONING" THE FAIRVIEW DEVELOPMENTAL CENTER SITE

THE FIRST OF A SERIES OF MEETINGS ON THE FDC

On Thursday, November 2, 2023 I trekked across town from my far Eastside home to the Costa Mesa Senior Center for the first of what is to be a series of community meetings to discuss the future of the 112+ acre site of the Fairview Developmental Center (FDC) - near the center of Costa Mesa.

CHANGING TREATMENT MEANS SURPLUS LAND

This city-sponsored, consultant-facilitated gathering was intended to provide an opportunity for residents and other interested parties to present their views of how this site may be used in the future.  The State of California has changed the model of how they handle folks with “developmental” issues - closing a few large sites like the FDC around the state and choosing, instead, to go to a smaller “home” model.  This freed-up several hundred acres of state-owned property, which will be sold off.  The State gave Costa Mesa $3.5 million to do the planning, re-zoning, etc., for this site, after which The State will select a Master Builder to fulfill the plans.

STATE GIVE AND TAKE

A couple sidebars - First, The State has required our city to plan for - and zone for - 11,760 more dwelling units (our current Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA) over the next 6 years. (We’re already 2 years  into the 8-year cycle).  And, despite the fact that the FDC site will become available, The State dropped another shoe when it announced that it was withholding 15 acres of that site for an Emergency Operations Center to serve Southern California - which included a 35,000 square foot Administration Building, a 20,000 square foot warehouse, a helipad for large military-style choppers to come and go AND a 120 foot communications tower, resplendent with gaudy orange and white paint and flashing lights.

A VERY SMALL TURNOUT

Of the 50 or so attendees, many were familiar faces - the “usual suspects”.  I recognized former council member and mayor Sandra Genis, former council members Wendy Leece and Jay Humphrey and a couple current planning commissioners.  Also, residents Cynthia McDonald and Rick Huffman (the husband and wife team who have done much of the heavy-lifting on housing-related issues in our city for more than a decade) showed up, armed with the Specific Plan for the Sonoma Site - a similar site in Northern California.  I don’t always agree with their solutions to issues, but I ALWAYS appreciate their efforts.  There were NO current council members at this meeting - perhaps fearing being sandbagged into speaking, as was the case at the recent state-sponsored meeting at the FDC.

THE PREVIOUS MEETING

About that meeting -  The State, through their consultant, held a similar meeting at the FDC site to gather input.  Fewer than 100 people showed up for that one and none came away satisfied with the results.  Costa Mesa Brief covered that meeting, but there was NO video coverage by The City, or anyone else, of this meeting.

BACK TO THIS MEETING

This meeting was optimistically set up the  Great Room at the Costa Mesa Senior Center for 192 participants.  Snacks and drinks were provided, as was a daycare center for those who had to bring children to this event.  I say “optimistically” because just 50 people showed up for this very important event.  This was to be an “English-only” event, with a “Spanish-only” event to be held at the same venue the next night. (More on that at the end of this report).  Plus, there is scheduled a virtual (Zoom) meeting for Monday, November 6th at 6 p.m.

AGAIN, NOTIFICATION IS AN ISSUE

Some attendees complained about not having received notification of this meeting until the day before via an email blast.  From my standpoint, apparently because I actually DO pay attention to these things, I received at least a half dozen notices and alerts about this series of meetings over the past week or so.

CITY STAFF AND CONSULTANTS MODERATED THE EVENING

The meeting began shortly after 6 p.m. when city staffer Sherry Vander Dusen kicked it off with an introduction of the purpose, then handed the ball off to Suzanne Schwab of the consulting firm, Placeworks.  She, and her associate, Karen Gulley, ran the rest of the meeting and did their very best to stay on the schedule included in the very helpful handout package.

THE PURPOSE

The purpose of this meeting was to: 

1-Start a dialogue and share information with the community, 

2-Gather input for the Vision and Guiding Principles

3-Listen to community ideas and concerns

4-Outcome: a community led draft vision statement and set of guiding principles

HISTORY AND PROJECTIONS
The consultants provided some background of the site, a description of the current facilities, a summary of State and City actions which included a projection of the completion of this process by September, 2025.

PROCESS SCHEDULE

They also described their role in this 2-year process and the community’s opportunities for input, listed as:

Website - FDCHousingPlan.com

Workshops - 4 throughout the process each will be provided in multiple formats:

      English

      Spanish

      Virtual

City Council Study Sessions - 2 updates/check-ins, will be public meetings.

HOUSING GOAL

They spoke about the City’s Housing Goal based on the as-yet uncertified Housing Element.  The City and State agree that housing shall be the priority use for this site and spoke briefly of a 2,300 units minimum use for the site (23 units per acre), of which 40% would be Low and Very Low Income Housing.  They provided a chart defining the income levels.

SURROUNDING USES AND TREES

They discussed the existing surrounding land uses, bike paths and roadways.  They spoke of the arborist hired to evaluate the existing tree canopy - defined at this time as 790 mature trees on the site.

TYPES OF HOUSING

They gave examples of potential housing types, ranging from 10-17 units per acre and progressing to those types that would be in the 30-100 units per acre, and showed examples of existing housing in Southern California.

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS

After the consultant presentation microphones were made available to participants to ask questions/make comments.  Your humble correspondent was the first to thrust his pudgy paw into the air, so I was the lead-off batter.  I told the room that if a helipad is actually included in this plan (it was NOT shown on the graphics provided), then this plan is a non-starter because NOBODY will want to live near the landing/takeoff pattern of large military-style helicopters.  Those beasts cannot be simply plopped down in a 50 square foot plot - they require runout and approach areas.  In her response to my comment Director Jennifer Le left us with a vague comment that the “helipad may not be part of this plan”, but she didn’t have a firm confirmation. Fewer than half of the attendees rose to ask questions/make comments at this point.

GROUP ACTIVITY

Following the Q & A the attendees engaged in a Group Activity, in which each group (table) discussed and summarized elements they felt were important to be considered, then each table/group (12 of them) “report out” their results.  Those “results” - large pieces of paper with thoughts scrawled on them - were taped to the back wall and participants were encouraged to fix green stickers (balls) to each element with which they agreed.  

MY TAKEAWAY

The meeting wrapped up shortly after the projected time of 8 p.m.  I came away from it cautiously optimistic.  Many of us have participated is similar meetings in past years and, in many cases, came away feeling that our thoughts/concerns fell largely on deaf ears.  Not so in this case.  And, because there are more meetings planned soon, there will be opportunities to measure the effectiveness of attendees comments.  Fingers crossed…

AN OBSERVATION UPON LEAVING

It has been my view that the FDC site could/should utilize tall buildings - 10+ stories - to house larger numbers of folks in affordable housing.  As I left the parking lot at the Senior Center I looked across the street at the Tower on 19th - the 18 story senior housing building which has around 270 units - and thought about how the FDC site could (should?) accommodate at least two or three of those structures and provide affordable housing for upwards of 5000 residents and still leave plenty of recreational space.

THE SPANISH-ONLY MEETING

On Friday, November 3rd, a similar meeting was held at the same venue.  It was crafted to provide information in Spanish to the nearly 40% of Costa Mesa’s residents who are primarily Spanish-speakers. I drove over to measure the turn-out.  The staff had, again very optimistically, provided round tables for 192 people.  They had an Irish-looking consultant delivering the message in Spanish.  When I departed at 6:25 there were 7 attendees in the room - outnumbered by staff and consultants - and one more was arriving as I left the building.  So, there were 8 people… disappointing, but not surprising.  I have no idea what kind of outreach was done to reach that demographic group.  I also have no idea what kind of questions/comments they might have made.  I DO know that somebody brought 4 pizzas and there was one child in the supervised game room made available again.

VIRTUAL MEETING MONDAY

I’m going to drop into the virtual meeting Monday, to see what kind of attendance that one generates and what kind of questions and answers are provided.  Here are the details: 

NOVEMBER 6, 2023

ZOOM MEETING ID: 821 8580 3444

PASSCODE: FDCSP1234

6PM-8PM

INFORMATION LINKS

If you want to check the official website for progress and to sign-up for information.  It’s my understanding the handout from this meeting will be posted on the website.  Here are two links for your use:

FDCHousingPlan.com

FDCHousingPlan@costamesaca.com

SO MANY WORDS, SO LITTLE INFORMATION

Yes, after all this palaver I neglected to post information about what the attendees thought.  I corrected that gaffe at a second entry, which you can read HERE

I’LL WRITE MORE

I’ll write about this as the process moves forward.  You cannot comment on the blog, but can return to my Facebook page if you wish to share a thought.